Monday, August 5, 2013

The Aliyah Manifesto: Sooo Expensive

Everything Costs A Lot When it is Frozen

Everything is cheaper in America. Falafel is now cheaper in America. Osem is cheaper in the United States. Osem is an Israeli food manufacturer. It should be cheaper where they make it. It should be cheaper before they ship it. The flight should not make it less expensive. The government must be taxing the entry tax for its own products, which were made in its own country. I did come up with a business model of shipping Bamba into Israel. Israelis love the peanut butter puffs they make in Israel. I figure that I can bring the Israelis the Israeli product. I will ship the Israeli product into Israel, and I will give it to them cheaper.
I don’t understand the infatuation with the Bamba peanut butter puffs. They aren’t even cheese puffs, which taste so much better. I won’t eat Bamba. Why? Because cheese puffs taste better. I can’t believe Israelis haven’t heard about cheese puffs. I know they haven’t, because if they had they would be eating them and feeding them to the little children. You have to feed children something unhealthy. At least you don’t take a chance with killing your child with a cheese puff. I can’t believe I gave up cheese puffs for peanut butter puffs. Do you now understand what it is to be an Oleh? What you give up as an immigrant? If there was one reason for my leaving Israel, it would be cheese puffs. Driving with cheese on my fingers and rubbing the cheese all over the steering wheel, or whatever serial and dye number mixed with element that the cheese puffs are made of. I will still sell Bamba.
Good point. I did have cheese puffs the other day, but I did pay 35nis for that bag. So don’t go all ‘Israel has everything America has’ on me. I am a little on edge about that with my Aliyah. Why doesn’t Israel have America? I’m in Israel, living in Israel and it is not America. I made Aliyah and I have the American Gd given right to complain.
Olim get too excited about this American product thing. ‘Israel has hamburgers. Awesome…We can watch the Super Bowl…’ You can watch the Super Bowl at 4am. In America they watch it in the afternoon. Even Americans are not that American. In America, they sleep. No American in America even watches the Super Bowl past the first half, unless they are a football fan. But we get so excited that we are even willing to rent a hotel room for the Super Bowl. I will never forget the miracle day that I heard that a random store on the way to Har Nof received Marshmallow Fluff for only 70nis a pint. And they still had no soft white bread to spread it on.
New Olim get so excited to point out to their heretic friends in Chutz L’Aretz (outside of the land- the land being Israel) that you can get anything in Israel now. ‘We have American products.’ That is true, but you have to pay an enjoyment tax. $220 for a box of Entenmann’s donuts!! Israel is not America. ‘Move to Israel and you can pay for somebody to start a business off your desire to still be living in America’- that is what I tell my Chutz L’Aretz friends. You olim who care so much to point out to everybody that they should be living in Israel, that is the new Zionist pitch you should be using. ‘Make Aliyah and support Entenmann’s Aliyah by paying for the donut and its seat on the plane.’ Each donut gets its own seat.
We have the products, they are just older. We are paying for the donuts pension plan too; $220 for the frozen donut. Donuts do not come out of the freezer section. The only thing that can come out of the freezer section with a hole are Lender’s Bagels. We are expecting the Lender’s Bagels to be disgusting and that is why they are allowed to be frozen. A product making it to Israel does not make it OK to freeze. Frozen works for meat. Wait, if meat was 3 years old we would also be complaining about freezer burn. It is hard to beat the expiration on some of these boxes. The box gets flown over, they hold it in customs, 250% tax the donut and its seat on the plane, eat half the donuts in the box and then sell them. By the time the government ate the only good donuts, chocolate glazed and white crumby style- leaving the plane ones, and 250% taxed the donut and its seat on the plane, it had already been frozen in the Ashdod port for 2 years of summer. They couldn’t even freeze the Ice City Exhibition in Jerusalem for 2 weeks. I am still impressed that the donuts from the Ashdod port are good till 2019.
We get stuff from all over the world. We also get Argentinian meat. Awesome! But it is frozen. Frozen means it might have been good. And may I point out, nobody freezes the good stuff ever. You freeze leftovers. Unless you are my mom and you are saving the good stuff for the Passover, when the guests come. Even that isn’t good once it has been freezerified. The guests don’t even like it. It is more of a punishment, to show us that the good stuff is not for us. That is what frozen is. It is a punishment. Frozen vegetables are a punishment. ‘Here you go…the vegetables with nutrients that have been frozen out. A little punishment for not eating your green-beans.’ Freezing cheese puffs is just wrong.
The good stuff in Israel is the produce. So enjoy that. But understand, you gave up every good preservative in the world. Frozen is not a preservative. Now, Ben & Jerry’s doesn’t taste the same. How can they mess up Ben & Jerry’s? Israel has the best dairy produce in the world. But they can’t figure out ice cream. They get the additives wrong. I don’t want healthy homemade stuff. I want preservatives. When I made Aliyah, I didn’t realize I was giving up preservatives. I could give up mom’s macaroni and cheese, but damn the day I have to stop eating Wacky Mac. I don’t even want dairy anymore. Just one more time, I want unfrozen B325 dyed ink, with a dash of omega19.
I now eat Israeli food. I have learned to be happy with Israeli food, such as pizza, hamburgers and apple pie. I don’t even care to eat American food in my new country. If I don’t get a stomach ache after dinner, I know the shwarma wasn’t fresh.
I used to starve and not eat till my trips to Chutz L’Aretz, where my Entenmann’s costs $2.50 without VAT (value added tax) before the discount. When they ship the boxes back to America, you apparently don’t have to pay the taxes anymore. And while I was at it, I would enjoy some Bissli and Bamba. And yes, when I visit I also enjoy my meat that wasn’t frozen. Not the meat in my mom’s freezer; that is for the guests.
I never even heard of VAT when I lived in America. Some products are made in the USA and the stuff they ship in from China has no value. You see, being in Israel I have become more of an American patriot then when I was in America.
The point is that there is a problem when you have to freeze a preservative to keep food fresh.

We have the products in Israel. We don’t have the deals. I could buy a home in Israel. They have those in Israel too. But I don’t have 3 million dollars. I gave up a $100,000 five bedroom home, near the Jewish community, in the cheaper area with those people. If you say ‘those’ it is not prejudice. I have learned that in my world travels and from my mom. It is not racist if you are vague.
They do have the $1 Store in Israel, but that is 5 shekel. I have told them to call it the Dollar & Thirty Three Cent Store. They could even call it the We Add On A Lot of Tax to Your Dollar Store. Someday, maybe Israel will be America. If the $1.33 Store with Taxes can make it to Israel, anything can. There are neighborhoods in Israel with ‘those’ people, the Israeli society is becoming much dumber, and I do have my parents visiting. I am a spiritual man and I believe that honoring your parents has a lot to do with allowing them to pay your bills.
Why did I move to Israel?, you still ask. Because I like being me and I am sure my parents are willing to smuggle in some Twizzlers, cheese puffs and Osem with freezer burn.

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